5/19/2009 -- If you're thinking that Exam 83-640 TS: Windows Server 2008, Active Directory, sounds familiar, you'd be right. Exam 83-640 is the virtualized version of Exam 70-640 TS: Windows Server 2008, Active Directory.

Microsoft officially released the exam last week, to coincide with numerous announcements that were made at last week's Microsoft Tech-Ed Conference in Los Angeles.

According to a press release, Exam 83-640 is "the first to incorporate a virtual environment with the tools and options available in a real computing environment."

The exam itself incorporates multiple choice items and virtualized, performance-based questions in which test takers must perform tasks as if working on a real server. The exam objectives state that the exam maps directly with the same objectives as 70-640. Although it's available mostly worldwide, it's delivered in English only.

When Exam 83-640 was in development, a pilot test version was released to testers as 70-113 TS back in July 2008. (To read the original news on 70-113, go here; a review of the pilot version of this exam is available here.) Michael Domingo